Find the Perfect Image with the Free Photo Library

You’ve got thousands of options to choose from right in your WordPress app.

May 9, 2018

Thomas Bishop

You’re finishing up a blog post and want to add a photo, but you don’t have the right image. There’s a solution right in your WordPress mobile app: the Free Photo Library.

As part of our never-ending mission to improveMedia in the WordPress apps, you now have access to over 40,000 free, high-quality photos (courtesy of Pexels) right from the WordPress mobile app. It’s available to every WordPress.com member.

(Did we mention that they’re free? And so are the WordPress apps, if you still haven’t downloaded one! They’re available here.)

How does it work?

To get started, make sure you’ve updated the WordPress app on your phone or tablet to the latest version (9.9). Once you’ve updated the app, you can find and add free photos to your library directly from the post and page editor, or from within the Media Library:

Adding from the Editor

Open the Editor by either creating a new post or opening an existing one. Once you’ve opened the Editor, tap the icon to open the Media Picker. You’ll see a few different options to choose from: device, camera, or WordPress media.

If you’re on Android, tap the Device Media icon ( ), and select “Choose from Free Photo Library” from the menu.

If you’re on iOS: tap the ••• icon, and select “Free Photo Library” from the options.

Next, search for a photo to add to your post. Select as many images as you’d like and tap the “Add” button on the bottom right of the screen. That’s it! The images are inserted into your post or page, and they’re also added to your Media Library seamlessly. (Note: these images will count against your site’s media storage limits.)

Adding from the Media Library

To add from your Media Library, navigate to My Sites ( ) and choose your site. From there, navigate to “Media, tap the button in the top right corner, and select “Free Photo Library” from the menu.

From here, the process is the same: select as many photos as you want and tap “Add” to put them into your post or page and your Media Library.

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69 Comments

I usually search the web for public domain images, so this was a great article for me. It doesn’t work on my iPhone X (when I click the three dots, I don’t get the Free Library option), but it works great on my laptop. I do all of my website work from the PC, so it’s not a problem, but you might want to check and see why some users don’t have access to the library on iOS, though. Thanks, great post!

Thank you for the kind words, I’m glad you liked the post! This feature is designed to work with WordPress.com sites, but also works with Jetpack-powered self-hosted sites. If your site fits these criteria and your WordPress app is updated to version 9.9+, you should see that option in the menu. If you’re still not seeing the option, please feel free to let us know by going to Me → Help & Support → Contact Us.

Hey there, we’d love to help! Would you mind reaching out to our in-app support team by tapping Me → Help & Support → Contact Us. If you’re not using the WordPress apps, you can contact us directly through your WordPress.com account here: https://wordpress.com/help/contact. You can also read more information about various issues on our Support pages here: https://en.support.wordpress.com. Thank you for using WordPress!

The catch with this is that it uses up your storage. There’s absolutely no workaround if you want a featured image. Otherwise it’s possible to go to the Pexels website and just use the image URL to add it to your post.

That’s correct, adding any media to your Media Library will take up storage space, and also possible in some places it is possible to use the direct image URL. If you have any additional questions or feedback about the WordPress mobile apps, you can reach out to our in-app support team by tapping Me → Help & Support → Contact Us. Thanks for checking out this feature!

Hey Chris, I’m not sure what the pipeline looks like for new themes, but I can ping the theme team on Monday. If you haven’t already, I’d recommend checking out all available themes at https://wordpress.com/themes. Thanks for checking out the new feature!

Yeah, I have, thanks, Thomas. Not a big deal. Just wondered because you normally release a new one (or two) every two or three months, and I think it’s been about five now. Just look forward to checking out new themes, that’s all. 🙂

It does not work. Trying from the media and pressing plus I do not get the free photo library but `Choose from the free photo library’. Then I am asked to choose a number!
I cannot get it from the editor because my app. will not allow me to reach the editor. It says I am logged in but I am not, and when it says log in here I press and get a blank screen with a big W in it.

MJ — I just saw this (along with T Bishop reply — hi there!) I’m a journalist and part-time college educator and am posting bylined student work with their consent– I’m only about one-third of the way through the entire trove. I used the FREE media library via full website (on my laptop) and while the photo choices MIGHT be limited, it gives you a way to wade in the shallow end of the pool and possibly work a tad faster than otherwise. For my student work, I am deliberately using a reporting/storytelling motif (pix of computers, notebooks, iPhones) to simulate their experiences “in the field” rather than fool around with actual news photos (and wind up embarrassing myself — and them — with photos of “incorrect” news events.) As wonderful a resource as the feral Internet halls are, sometimes it is helpful to start with a limited quantity, then expand. Just my opinion. Suffice to say I experiment a lot but I WAITED til I had approx a dozen articles posted on old-school B&W site BEFORE going photo shopping in Media Library THEN experimenting with background colors (before my frmr students who are MEN accuse me of a website that looked too feminine for their taste — LOL). Enjoy yourself on your site! — Lydia

This is great. It leaves me with no option but to use the app. There are many times I choose to discuss an idea and can’t find the right photo. But with app I will an efficient user. Thanks again to the WordPress team for introducing such a brilliant idea.

Hi there! Free Photo Library gives you access to all of the photos that are available on the Pexels.com database of free, open-source images. In other words, if it’s available on Pexels, you can find it using Free Photo Library in your WordPress app! I hope this helps!

This really sounds great!… But, I’m just a simple, old grandma using just a desktop — could you give more detailed directions for getting to the Free Photo Library on WordPress.com from my web browser?… I’ve searched around a bit, but can’t seem to find an opportunity for reaching the Free Photo Library… Thank you for helping and for making pictures available…

Hi, I take photos for my post from my iPhone but because the photo width size larger than 960px I have to resize it but resizing the image decrease the quality of image. Is there any application that keeps the quality same when resize the image ?

Hey there! By default, image quality should not be changed from within the WordPress mobile apps. However, there are settings inside *Me > App Settings* for optimizing image upload size, etc. If you have any more questions or feedback about the WordPress mobile apps, please feel free to reach out to our in-app support team by tapping Me → Help & Support → Contact Us. I hope that helps!

This is great and very timely — I have two blogs about reading – one for SF and one for poetry. The photos have already helped me to rethink my postings. It’s great to have a photo resource right at my blog site — Thank you !

I spend most of my time at my big monitor attached to my laptop, and it worked perfectly to get an image of a woman in a sari. Is there are comprehensive set of instructions on what is available free from this, or do I just guess in the search bar. I typed in ‘sari’ and ‘woman in sari’ and got nothing; then I typed in ‘India’ and found a woman in a bright orange sari with a twig broom. So it depends on how the images are labeled internally. I’m used to having to get creative!

Can we add text to the photos? Stencil gives me ten free images a month and the ability to put text on them to make a highly individualized graphic.

Hi there! You have access to photos that are available on Pexels.com’s photo library, which is 40,000+ photos. Search results depend on how the photos are labeled, so you might have to get creative in some cases 🙂

We don’t currently have any text-stylizing features inside the WordPress mobile apps, but there are certainly a number of great apps that let you do this with your photos!

Yes. The new photo library feature is awesome. We can search there as we usually do in Google. I am using wordpress since this January. Really, It is so useful to learn and explore in many ways. Thank you Team!

Great question! By default you aren’t required to give attribution, but we are already working on an update that will make it easy to – by default in fact. I don’t have a timeline for when it’ll be implemented, but it is in the works!